Page 95 of Love Game

“For how many years?” Kate asked.

“No. There’s no way.” Danny shook his head so hard his vision blurred, but one thing remained perfectly clear to him. There was no way he was letting his wife settle for anything less than everything she deserved.

“But this could buy us time. Buy you some time to prove what you can do,” she argued.

“You’ve already proven what you can do. Over and over again.” Danny turned back to Mike. “No one knows what she deserves better than you. I can’t believe you had the balls to come down here and try to serve us this steaming pile of crap on today of all days. The same day you stood next to me as I vowed to love and honor her,” he snarled, his voice rising.

Mike raised both hands to hold off the onslaught. “I’m doing what my job requires me to do, just as we all have from time to time. Right?” He fixed Danny with a pointed glare. “But now that I can say that the offer has been rejected…” He paused and turned that unflinching stare on Kate. “You are rejecting this offer, aren’t you?”

Her gaze zipped toward Danny and then back to Mike. “I, uh, yeah. I am.” She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin a notch. “As a matter of fact, my price just went up another half mil. And I think we need to look at schools with better football facilities. That practice field is ridiculous, and no one converts their stadiums between football and baseball anymore.”

“Actually, a lot of them still do,” Danny murmured in her ear.

“Shut up. I’m trying to get you a wedding present.” She made a face. “Besides, who in their right mind enjoys watching baseball?”

“More exciting to watch snail races,” Danny agreed.

She beamed up at him. “I knew I liked you for a reason.”

Mike made a show of clearing his throat. When neither of them looked over, he resorted to shouting an “Ahem!”

Danny chuckled and turned his attention back to his friend. “Yes?”

“I thought I might mention that when I was in the war room with the wonder twins earlier, I heard the names Tulane and Baylor being bandied around. There’s a room service elevator off the other end of the kitchen. You can use it to join your agents in the temple of greed.” Mike backed off a step as his cell rang. A sly smile curved his lips as he checked to see who the caller was. “Speaking of greed, will you look at that…”

Activating the call, Mike pressed the phone to his ear and boomed. “Hello, Mr. Donner. Yes. Yes, it’s true,” he said, making shooing motions with his hand. “No, I don’t want to lose them either.”

Trusting his friend to come through with the clutch catch, Danny took Kate’s hand and started through the kitchen. “Come on. Let’s see what Tulane has to offer besides gumbo.”

“I do love a fresh beignet,” Kate said, trotting to catch up with him in her heels.

* * *

Twenty minutes later, their respective agents were debating the relative merits of swampy Louisiana summers versus all the things that seemed to go wrong in and around Waco when an insistent knock rattled the door. Kate kept her eyes glued to the list of offers and terms she’d received from various universities as she murmured to Danny, “I think that’ll be for you.”

Her new husband huffed a laugh and pushed himself off the suite’s sofa and stalked to the door. “Are you claiming to be clairvoyant now too, Coach Everybody-Wants-Me?”

“Nope, just busy looking over my options. I figured it’d be best to keep you occupied while I work.”

“Funny girl,” he grumbled, reaching for the handle.

“You’re not fired,” Mike announced, then brushed past Danny, barreling into the room as only a man who’d downed one too many energy drinks could. Stopping short of Gene’s spot at the quasi-conference table, he crossed his arms over his chest. “We’re not drawing up papers. There will be no termination.”

The agent eyed him shrewdly. “There was a verbal offer and acceptance of Coach McMillan’s resignation.”

“We’re prepared to pay a modest bonus to offset any distress we may have put Coach McMillan through over the past couple of days.”

Kate dropped the legal pad she was holding when she spotted Richard Donner framed in the doorway. “I thought you were on your way to Hong Kong.”

Richard pursed his lips. “Funny thing about planes. You can turn them around.”

Mike plowed ahead, his movements jerky but purposeful. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small neon-green slip of paper. She gasped when he unfolded the sticky note she’d given him with her salary proposal and slapped it down onto the table in front of Jonas.

“Congratulations, Coach Snyder. This should make you the highest paid women’s basketball coach in the NCAA. By a mile.”

Kate narrowed her eyes as she rose from the sofa. “And the half mil we discussed earlier?”

“I added it on.”

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